Hidden Agenda
by Wishing For Rainy Days
Summary: OneShot. " . . that's Dorcas Meadowes, Voldemort killed her personally . . ." (Book 5) it's always been my belief that there had to be a rather personal reason for Voldemort to give himself the trouble. This is a story about what that reason might be...


_**DISCLAIMER:** The ideas are mine, the characters, sadly are not._

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><p><em>"Come here, I've got something that might interest you,' he said. From an inner pocket of his robes Moody pulled a very tattered old wizarding photograph. 'Original Order of the Phoenix,'" Harry Potter, Book 5<em>

_At some point, when Moody is pointing out people in that photograph, he says:_

_" . . that's Dorcas Meadowes, Voldemort killed her personally . . ." _

_And it's always been my belief that there had to be a rather personal reason for Voldemort to give himself the trouble. This is a story about what that reason might be..._

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><p><strong>Hidden Agenda<strong>

Dorcas Meadowes walked fast across the corridors of the castle, glancing at her pocket watch every few minutes. It was past midnight already, a time by which even sixth year students should be in their common rooms, but the girl had received a message from Professor Slughorn earlier, calling all of his pupils for yet another Slug Club meeting. Apparently several guests had traveled from Africa, especially for this event. He had even gotten a special permit from Dippet, for his pupils to be outta bed after curfew**. **The meetingwas that big. At least that was what the scared-looking first year Slytherin boy in charge of delivering the message had told her a few hours earlier in the library.

She was tired. Between quidditch practice and her prefect duties there was very little time to do anything other than trying to cope with the enormous amount of material she had to study. Even now, as she walked fast down the staircases, Dorcas' eyelids fell slightly, indicating her need for sleep, and her back curled under the weight of what seemed to be more books than her backpack could handle. Professor Dumbledore had promised to teach her a weight-relieving spell one of these days, after their last transfiguration class, one he found most useful during his own sixth year, but she hadn't yet have the time to drop by his office and spare the number of minutes that were necessary to learn it.

Classes had gotten harderasthe professors had started them on non-verbal spells, not in one class, but in all of them at once. Sleeping was a luxury N.E.W.E.T level students were not allowed to enjoy. Dorcas had been so busy the girl didn't even have time to worry about finding a date to the yule ball in a few weeks, whichunfortunately seemed to be all anyone else seemed able to think about.

As she ran down the dungeons making her way to the lowest levels of the castle, Dorcas dreamed about taking a hot shower and allowing herself to fall in bed, and not wake up till the sun was down in the horizon again. She had considered missing Professor Slughorn's feast this time, but she had missed two of them already, and in spite of his pompous manners, she really cared about the potions master.

The dungeon she was supposed to find was one they never used in potions class. Dungeon number sixteen, one of the largest, more deep into the castle even than Slytherins**'** common room. She had never been there before, but it was not difficult to find. The corridors leading in the right direction had been adorned with torches of bright green flames, and there was music playing in the distance.

But when the girl and opened the door of dungeon sixteen, the only person she saw standing there was Tom Riddle.

Most dungeons located far beneath the castle were little more than extremely large cells, with naked walls and potion stained roofs, but the one she and Tom were in looked like a ball room. There were torches emanating green frames a few metres apart from one another, with beautiful medieval tapestries in between. In a corner, a dinner table with candle lights had been placed by a pianoforte whose keys danced up and down as if an invisible person sat by the instrument**, **but there was nobody around.

"I don't understand."

"I sent a false message, Dorcas. I knew you wouldn't come here unless you thought a teacher had summoned you."

Her reaction went from perplexity to anger in a fraction of a second, and then back to astonishment. Riddle had invited her to the Yule Ball a few days earlier, and although no other boy had thought to invite her yet, she refused her fellow prefect's proposal right away. The sixteen year-old would never guess Tom would go through such lengths to make her change her mind.

He had somewhat overdone himself. Tom had worked for hours in that dungeon, and it took powerful transfiguration. He wanted to make it perfect, so the girl had no choice but to accept him.

Not that he cared about a teenage banality such as the Yule Ball, but his closest _friends_ did. In their small minded mentality, only losers didn't have dates to a ball, and Lord Voldemort – the acronym he'd been considering to adopt - couldn't afford to be thought of in this manner. It was much easier to find a girl to dance with than to try and change the way they felt about it, and it was important that he did have a date, because all of the others looked up to him somehow.

Furthermore, as preoccupied as he was with his plans for the future, he was a sixteen year old boy. He did think about girls sometimes. Since he had to indulge the expectations of his colleagues, he wouldn't choosejust any girl. He would choose the one that had caught his attention somehow, the beautiful Dorcas Meadowes.

They were in the same year, the same house, andthey were both prefects. She was the one student in theiryear whose scholastic achievements were significantenough to challenge him, and she was beautiful. Dorcas had a long dark brown hair, generally arranged in a pony tail so that it wouldn't get in her way as she played quidditch or performed spells. Her eyes were green, which seemed to match the green of her uniforms incredibly well. There was also an unspoken elegance in her air and manner of walking, undoubtedly a trait granted to herby a long pure blood lineage.

There was something else as well: she was cold. She walked tall through the corridors of Hogwarts, and no boy would ever have the courage to approach her. They all thought she was too much, and they were right. She was the one girl everybody wanted but nobody could have.

But what Lord Voldemort wants, he usually gets.

"Listen, I know you're upset with me." He started.

"I don't understand. I got a message signed by Professor Slughorn."

"Professor Slughorn is a romantic." Tom explained. "And when I told him I wanted to ask you out to the ball he was very eager to help. He was rather excited at the prospective of two of his favorite students ending up together."

"Riddle, you already asked me, and I already gave you an answer."

"Dorcas, please**,**" Tom interrupted. "I've prepared all this for you. Give me at least one dance."

It was a request, not an order, and that tone surprised Dorcas enough for her to allow the boy to take her to the middle of the room. Soon his hand layon her waist while her own left arm on his shoulder. Before she could notice, they were moving softly to the music, his body so close to her she could feel Riddle's breath on her cheek.

"Did you like the room?" He asked in her ears, softly.

"It must have been difficult to conjure all of this." She remarked.

"I was inspired." He answered, and there was a jovial and natural tone to his answer. "I am not without skill, you know."

"My denying your request has nothing to do with your skills, Riddle. Maybe I don't care about what you can or can't do." Dorcas said firmly.

"Still,-" he insisted, "I'm not just talking about a silly school dance, Dorcas. I know you're more than that."

"What am I, Riddle?"

"I can't say what you are, but I can say what you could be." He answered. "I'm going to be a great man one day, Dorcas, and you could be by my side. You could be that great woman behind a great man. And you would have everything you always wanted. Every woman in the magical world would die to be in your place."

"The problem with you is that you're so full of yourself you can barely see what happens around you, Riddle." Dorcas said softly, and stopped dancing, only to step back and stare at him, a cold disdain in her eyes, as the music played on. "I can be great on my own, Riddle. I will never be _behind_ anybody else, let alone you."

"I didn't mean that." Riddle said in attempt to mend his words, astounded at being abandoned in the middle of a dance.

"Of course you did. You truly believe you are this great man already! I've heard you talking to Avery and Lestrange, and everybody in the common room knows the kind of plans you have for after school."

"If you know what I'm planning to do, you know just how far I can reach."

"I don't think you are going to make it, Riddle, and I'm going to do everything in my power to stop you."

"I'm giving you a chance to be with me, yet instead you chooseto defy me!"

"I don't want your chance, Riddle. I don't want anything to do with you."

"But I want to take you to the Yule Ball with me, Dorcas."

"Well, you can't always get what you want." She said, before turning her back and walking away, slamming the door behind her.

"Hello, Dorcas."

In spite of the decades which had gone by since they'd finished School, Dorcas would never fail to recognize that thick voice. It had changed, of course. Turned colder. Harsher. But it was still Riddle's voice.

"Hello, Riddle."

"Nobody calls me by that hideous name anymore**,**" Voldemort said, coldly, controlling his anger. "I am Lord Voldemort now."

"Your _friends _called you that even before we finished school, Riddle. I didn't use that nickname then and I certainly will not use it now."

She infuriated him by using that muggle's name he wanted so badly to leave behind, and Voldemort had never been too good in controlling his emotions.

"My _Death Eaters_are here, waiting outside. They have conjured my Mark over your house."

"I imagined as much. You would not be so foolish as to send one of your _servants _in here and risk losinga dedicated _**E**__ater_ in a combat with a superior opponent**,**" She said. She really was a superior opponent. "In fact," Dorcas continued, "I remember beating you in dwelling club more than once."

"It's been a long time," Voldemort smiled. "You have aged."

It was true. Nearly forty years had gone by since their school days, and they hadn't done Dorcas any favours. Riddle's face, however carved by his arrogance and marked by scars of the battles he'd fought was still boyishly handsome, whilst Dorca's forehead had been marked by lines of expression as years passed. She was a powerful witch, but she was no longer a young woman.

"You have aged as well." She provoked him, and Voldemort laughed coldly

"I have. But my memory is intact, Dorcas, and if I remember correctly, you own me a dance." With a wave of his wand, the same music he had chosen all those years ago started to echo in those walls, and in a second move he hit the woman with an Imperius curse.

She was resilient. He commanded her to dance with him**,** and the woman resisted for as long as she could, until tears came down her eyes and she couldn't keep her legs from moving anymore.

"This could have gone in a completely different way, you know?" He asked softly, "I've heard you joined Dumbledore's circus. The Order of the Phoenix, is that not the way you call yourselves?"

Dorcas' efforts to resist the curse were so great she couldn't talk. She could barely breathe.

"I think I prefer you when you are quiet." He remarked and then danced silently to his unwilling partner until the music ended and he greeted Dorcas with a bow of the head. "But you owe me something else, don't you?"

It was then that he pulled her hair, approaching her face to his own. Then he whispered in her ear, causing shivers to run down her spine.

"What Lord Voldemort wants, he gets."

And that was when he kissed her. It was a violent kiss, not at all like the naive touching of their lips he'd attempted to all those years ago. It was brutal_. _Whilehe kissed her, feeling her tears wetting his face, Voldemort held his wand against her neck. They were so close there was barely any green light at all, and her body fell unconscious in his arms in the middle of the kiss. Then he let it hit the floor, motionless and used.

Voldemort allowed himself a final glance at Dorcas' body, broken by his feet, useless. All of that could have gone in a completely different way.

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><p><em><strong>AN:** This has been Beta-Read by aaliona_


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